Photographing Fashion
Art and Techniques
Photographing Fashion
Art and Techniques
Leigh Keily
CROWOOD
First published in 2015 by
The Crowood Press Ltd
Ramsbury, Marlborough
Wiltshire SN8 2HR
www.crowood.com
This e-book first published in 2015
Leigh Keily 2015
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 84797
Cover photography: Leigh Keily; styling: Rebekah Roy; model: Sofia Vranou; hair and make-up: Evan Huang; coat by Maryling
291: Sophia Vranou wears coat by Maryling, styled by Rebekah Roy, hair and makeup by Evan Huang.
292: Sophia Vranou wears necklace by Sara Angold, dress by AQ/AQ, styled by Rebekah Roy, hair and makeup by Evan Huang.
293: Sophia Vranou wears Dress by Clon8, Headdress by Fumbalinas, styled by Rebekah Roy, hair and makeup by Evan Huang.
Dedication
To my father Mike Keily, who bought me my first camera and darkroom kit
CONTENTS
CONTENTS
CONTENTS CONTENTS
CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS
CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS
CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS
CONTENTS CONTENTS
CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS
CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS
CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS
CONTENTS
CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS CONTENTS
CONTENTS
CONTENTS
Fig 0.1
High contrast, dramatic lighting and interesting backgrounds can provide exciting and visually arresting fashion photography.
Introduction
Fashion photography is an area that offers limitless scope for creation both in a commercial sense and as an artistic expression of the world around us. It can create a dream world, an inspiration, a mirror into another world of the impossible, or a reflection of our society, our troubles, apprehensions and realities. Fashion photography expresses our desires and our aesthetics. It changes with time and trends but remains an expression of ones individualism, realized through teamwork and collaborations. It is both a technical exercise and part of the heart.
This book aims to inspire you, both through teaching the technical aspects of fashion photography and allowing you to express yourself through your art. Fashion photography is so much more than simply the execution of a shoot you also need to market yourself, learn to retouch and edit images, manage delicate relationships with other people in the industry, and balance your work between expressive personal projects and money-making commercial jobs. From choosing a kit to directing a model, from getting started to developing advanced concepts, this book will guide you through the basic skills of being a fashion photographer. The steps you take next are part of an exciting journey to becoming successful where you can enjoy the amazing gift of creativity every day, be your own boss and enjoy a varied life of exciting projects and interesting work colleagues. Step up, work hard, and get reading.
Fig 1.1
Preparing the lighting for a busy fashion shoot.
Chapter
Basic Kit
CHOOSING A DSLR
The most obvious and essential part of the fashion photographers kit is the camera. Most fashion photographers are now working in the digital format, having abandoned film due to the fast turnaround, high quality and low cost of modern DSLRs Digital Single Lens Reflex cameras which contain a viewfinder which shows you exactly what youre going to shoot, with a mirror that pops out of the way when you press the shutter. Choosing your camera might seem like a daunting task, so well cover some basic terminology to help make that decision a little easier.
Brand
Canon and Nikon are the traditional choices for 35mm format DSLR cameras, but other contenders like Sony, Fuji and Olympus are producing cameras of similar specifications and features. Canon and Nikon provide safe choices and strong compatibility with third party accessories, a larger range of branded products, easy servicing and ease of hiring additional lenses and flash guns.
Megapixels
The megapixel count refers to the multiplication of the length and width of a digital image. In practical applications, a higher megapixel size allows you to blow up a print to larger dimensions. It also produces a higher RAW image size, so memory cards become fuller, faster. It is generally desirable to have as big a megapixel count as you can afford, though there are many other factors which also determine image quality for example, an iPhone 8-megapixel camera is no match for a digital SLR.
Sensor Size
There are currently two sizes of sensor being used in modern DSLRs: an senor and a full APS-C has a smaller physical size and is cheaper to produce, making it quite a common sensor in consumer-level digital cameras. Sensor sizes can vary by camera manufacturer, but due to their smaller size they produce a different angle of view from the lenss focal length. This crop factor or focal length multiplier normally multiplies regular lenses by a factor of around 1.5.
Professional cameras typically use the full sensor, which is larger than the APS-C and mirrors the dimensions of traditional 35mm film. As such it has a higher light sensitivity and no focal multiplication.
Capture Rate
The capture rate is the speed at which a camera can capture JPEG and RAW files, usually expressed as a number of images in a burst (quick succession) or the number of frames per second for continuous shooting.
Processor
Responsible for the clarity and the speed of the capture, the processing power is typically higher in the professional camera ranges; however, the consumer range carries processors far in excess of the demands of most novice fashion photographers. Modern cameras give clean captures at ISO settings under 800, with some noticeable digital grain sneaking in above ISO With most fashion work being captured at a relatively slow speed (in comparison to, for instance, sports photography), there is little need for a processor with a high capture rate.
